About

This is a personal blog and will reflect the work I do as an entrepreneur, angel investor facilitator, mentor, entrepreneurial policy lobbyist and GEW – Global Entrepreneurship Week Oslo organizer. We protect the information you share with us and read our private policy here.

If I was born in 762 and not in 1962 I for sure would have been a Viking, but would have preferred to go to the east for ventures, and not participated in the destruction of the abbey on the island of Lindisfarne and more violent stuff our ancestors was doing. But I can not be hundred percent sure about this because we are all children of our time and influenced by trends, the current trade, parents and our leaders.

Are currently involved in three startups in Oslo and are also Director of the Board at Oslo Entrepreneurs Association and working hard promoting the next GEW Oslo campaign.

My first entrepreneurial experience was when my father and I found a small field of chives, which I bundled with a pipe cleaner and sold it in the neighborhood of my little hometown Øksfjord for 1 NOK with tremendous profit until the source snowed down. I consider myself as a “self-made man” and an entrepreneur at heart.

That is the backdrop and here is a list of some of the startups and projects I have founded/cofounded;

Agaton – Rockband (1983)

Loppakroa – Local pub in Øksfjord (1987)

Bioscan Project – Large Renewable energy project (1993 – 1995)

Norbio Energy AS – Renewable energy project sold to Statoil (1995)

Global Direct Europe AS – Early version of LinkedIn ( 1998)

First Tuesday Trondheim (1999)

Roomaccess Ltd/Ziteco AS – Hospitality in-room system (2002)

Seed Forum – Investor Matchmaking (2003)

The Entrepreneurs House – Gründernes Hus AS – Coworking space (2011)

I grow up in Finnmark fare up north of the Arctic circle, and this has colored my personality and attitude. People have lived in Finnmark for over 10,000 years, and there are many traces of settlements and cemeteries of yesteryear. In Alta, we have the World Heritage Rock Art and petroglyphs that are more than 6,000 years old. WWII left dark marks in Finnmark. The Allies bombed vast areas of the buildings in Kirkenes, Vadsø and Vardø. When the German forces withdrew fall of 1944, they applied the “Scorched Earth”. More than 10,000 houses, schools, hospitals and churches were burned down. Also, much of the fishing fleet. About two-thirds of the population were forced to flee southwards, and also, my grandmother Thea, my mother Borgunn and uncle Per and Hans were forced into a small fishing boat at having to leave South. They were refugees in their country. When they went back in May 1945, the whole village was burned down, and they had to build it all up from scratch. I think that my families history has given me the “never give up” and “come back kid” attitude.

I moved from Øksfjord in 1992 and had lived most of my life after that in Trøndelag and left for Oslo in 2000 where I grow, prosper and have a good life.